Pelmanism

by Dilys Rose

Pelmanism Noun [mass noun] - a system of memory training - a card game in which matching pairs must be selected from memory from cards laid face down A young woman steps reluctantly from the train platform, arriving to visit the estranged father she has been running from for over two years. What follows are fragments of family life, Gala's memories of her father from childhood through to young adulthood. These disparate strands coalesce to reveal the complex bitterness and love shared between one young girl and her father, leading to what could be a heart-breaking and explosive reunion. Pelmanism is a razor-sharp portrait of mental illness and its impact on those around you.

224 pages, Hardcover

First published June 29, 2014

About the author

Dilys Rose is a Scottish fiction writer and poet. Born in 1954 in Glasgow, Rose studied at Edinburgh University, where she has been teaching Creative Writing since 2001. She is currently Director of the MSc in Creative Writing by Online Learning.

Rose has won many awards, including the Canongate Prize, the Macallan/Scotland on Sunday Short Story Competition, and a Robert Louis Stevenson Memorial Award; she has also been awarded a Society of Authors travel bursary and a UNESCO City of Literature exchange fellowship. Her poem Sailmaker's Palm won the 2006 McCash Poetry Prize, and her poetry collection Bodywork was shortlisted for the Sundial Scottish Arts Council Book Award. Rose's novel Red Tides won the 1993 Scottish Arts Council Book Award, as well as being shortlisted for the Saltire Society Scottish Book of the Year Award and the McVitie's Prize for Scottish Writer of the Year.

Her third novel Unspeakable was published by Freight Books in 2017.